37 Hours
by BravoKate
Summary: Special Agent Caitlin Todd likes to know exactly where she stands. So what on earth is she doing accepting a job offer from a man who does nothing by the book?


**Disclaimer: **NCIS does not belong to me. No copyright infringement is intended.

**A/N: **Tag to "Yankee White."

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Thirty-seven hours.

It doesn't seem possible that so little time has passed. As far as Kate's concerned, there's a way these things should work, and this isn't it. If her life as she knows it is going to fall apart, then that's fine. But it should at least take a full two days to happen. Anything less just feels…wrong.

Standing in an empty parking lot, staring at the back of the most frustrating, intriguing man she's ever met, Kate hardly recognizes her own life.

Thirty-seven hours ago, she had known exactly where she stood. She had been a Secret Service agent – a damned good one, too, all modesty aside – whose life had been governed by a strict set of rules and protocols. Well, her professional life, at least. And when your job description includes making sure the president lives through the day, there isn't a whole lot of room for anything else. Not that that had stopped Kate from having an illicit private life. Which, of course, was a big part of what had put her in this position in the first place.

Still, though, as stifling as the official policies and procedures of the Secret Service could be, there was a part of Kate that had _liked_ that aspect of her job. In all honesty, Kate knows she has a bit of an anal retentive side. Or maybe more than a bit. There's not a whole lot of point in lying to herself, after all.

So yes, Kate can admit – to herself, at least – that there had been something almost comforting about knowing exactly what the rules were. Knowing what she could and couldn't do. Knowing right where the line had been, and what would happen if she crossed it.

Because Kate likes structure. She likes knowing where she stands. She likes knowing exactly what is expected of her.

And thirty-seven hours ago, she had had a job that had given her all those things. Now, though, everything has changed. She has a new job. Or at least, she _thinks_ she does, because God forbid her new boss actually be straightforward about anything. And Kate has a strong suspicion that if she agrees to work for this unfathomable man, who infuriates her even as he fascinates her, structure and predictability are going to have no place in her new job.

It's all his fault, damn him. Special Agent Gibbs. Or maybe not _all_ his fault. The whole sleeping with a coworker thing might be on her. But still, if he hadn't come in, guns blazing (well, not exactly _blazing_, but still), she wouldn't be this damned…muddled. Confused. Lost, even.

He'd annoyed her from the moment he'd first spoken to her, embodying everything about men that pushed her buttons. The way he'd dismissed her, assuming she was inexperienced, that patronizing tone…Kate had dealt with men like him before. Egotistical, chauvinistic men, who assumed she was incompetent simply on the basis of her sex. Kate can't stand men like that, and from the very beginning, he'd done very little to convince her that he wasn't one of them.

She'd stood her ground, doing her best to show him that she wasn't about to be dismissed that easily. "I earned my jock strap," she'd told him, getting in his face as much as she really dared.

To her annoyance, he hadn't seemed the slightest bit deterred. He'd just looked at her with that wry, slightly amused smile she would see so much more of over the next day and a half, and ended up throwing _her _off balance. Her threat to shoot him hadn't been entirely empty.

As if that wasn't bad enough, he had proceeded to annoy her even more, poking around a highly classified airplane like he owned it, making demands in the tone of a man used to being obeyed. It might not have been so bad, if he had at least taken her strongly-worded protests seriously. Instead, though, he'd kept right on with his little monologue, referencing a Harrison Ford movie with the enthusiasm of some kind of overgrown teenager. Damn him.

And then there had been that stare of his, first encountered when she had revealed her relationship with Tim. "You gonna lecture me about sleeping with people you work with?" she had asked him, only half sarcastically.

He had answered with one of the monosyllabic responses she had come to learn were typical of him. "Nope." And then he had just _looked_ at her, making her feel more exposed than she ever had in her life. The phone call interrupting them had come as a relief.

But he hadn't let it go. Or rather, she hadn't. After all, she had been the one to bring it up again, not him. But something about the way he kept looking at her had made her want to attempt to explain herself. She hadn't been attempting to justify her behavior. She hadn't. She had just wanted to explain things in a logical, rational manner.

Instead, she had ended up tripping over her words and trying not to go blush under that damned unwavering gaze. She was a highly-trained agent, for heaven's sake. She had proven herself over and over again. So why had this infuriating man been able to make her feel like a fifteen-year-old again?

So really, it was his fault Kate was currently jobless. She'd known she and Tim were going to have to break it off. Even from the beginning, she had known that the relationship was a bad idea. She had decided to end it, really decided, well before she had met Gibbs.

But a part of her wonders if she wouldn't have left it at that. After ending the relationship, no one would ever have needed to know. If it hadn't been for Gibbs, would she have actually come clean to her superiors?

In the privacy of her own mind, Kate is able to admit that no, she probably wouldn't have. If she's absolutely honest with herself, she has to think that she would simply have told Tim that it was over, and left it at that. She wouldn't have thrown away her career over weird need to get rid of the cloud of guilt. The whole thing would have been a lot simpler, would have had a whole lot less of an impact on her life, if she had just kept her mouth shut. And she would have, if it hadn't been for Gibbs, and that damned _stare!_

Lord, he's infuriating! Impossible, insufferable, a complete bastard, all of that's true. And yet somehow, he still manages to be…well, kind of a good guy.

She had wanted to kill him when he'd steered her bodily into the lavatory, when he'd told her that Tim was dead, his words heavy with implication. She still remembers the helpless fury she'd felt, beating her fists against his chest weakly, lost in grief and rage.

She'd called him an asshole, and meant it. He was – he _is, _the smug bastard. But she also remembers the way he had held her, somehow managing to be comforting and professional at the same time, and the way he had returned her gun to her in a clear display of trust. It shouldn't have been possible, for her to be so furious at him, and at the same time, feel so much respect. Honestly, the man is so damned _irritating!_

And then there's the way he had followed her. "I heard you quit!" he'd told her, sounding entirely too cheerful about it. And then, "You pull that crap at NCIS, I won't give you a chance to resign."

He had simply ducked under the railing, leaving her staring at his back. Of all the presumptuous…not even bothering to _ask_ the question, just assuming she would say yes! Really, the man has some nerve!

Except, of course, that she _is_ going to say yes. Oh, Kate can pretend to be debating about it for a while, go through the motions of thinking it over, but who's she kidding? She knows she's going to accept the not-quite-job-offer. Why start lying to herself now? And it's not like she has a better offer. But really, she knows it's more than that. For some unfathomable reason, she _wants _to take the job.

Thirty-seven hours ago, Kate had known exactly where she stood. Now, she has no idea what awaits her. If she agrees to work with this crazy team of federal agents who don't seem to do anything by the book, this man who operates by his own set of rules, she can't ever be completely sure what she's getting into. But then, maybe predictability is overrated.

It's a cliché, of course, but Kate has a feeling if she takes this job, it's going to change her. And to be honest, she's not entirely sure she_ wants _to be changed.

So why on earth is she actually looking forward to it?

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**A/N: **Feedback is always appreciated. I'd love to hear from you!


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